gamma
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Forms
gamma n (indeclinable); also gamma, gammae f (first declension)[1][2]
Etymology
It is borrowed from Ancient Greek γάμμα (gámma), the name of the third letter of the Greek alphabet.[1][3][4] Köbler and Etymonline trace the Greek name to the name of a Semitic letter, which Etymonline says meant “camel”.[4][5]
Earliest recorded meaning
The OLD records it as the name of the Greek letter, used as a neuter and also as a feminine.[1] Köbler's first source is the writings of the Roman land surveyors.[4]
Semantic evolution
Besides the letter, the land surveyors used it for a field of rectangular shape, or of the shape of a gamma.[2][4] In Medieval Latin it named the gamut, the musical scale, after the third letter of the Greek alphabet.[6][4]
English has the letter name from about 1400.[5]
Timeline
- c. 310–394 AD – Ausonius uses it for the Greek letter in a poem on letters.[2][4]
- c. 1400 – English adopts it as the name of the Greek letter.[5]
Meanings
Noun
- The Greek letter gamma (Γ).[1][2]
- (surveying) A field of rectangular shape, the shape of a gamma.[2][4]
- (Medieval Latin, music) The gamut, the scale.[6][4]
Word family
- gammatus
Related words
- English gamma
References
- ^ a b c d Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
- ^ a b c d e Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- ^ Saalfeld, Günther Alexander (1874), Index Graecorum vocabulorum in linguam latinam translatorum, Berlin: Weidmann
- ^ a b c d e f g h Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
- ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
- ^ a b Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill